Unlike some people, I’m happy to admit that I’ve made mistakes. In fact, as several of you have pointed out, I made one at 8:53am last Friday, when I claimed that a certain young man–or rather, his tattooiste–had misspelled “racism” on a very large back tattoo.
I was wrong.
Due to the vagaries and flourishes of blackletter type, the “i” in his “racism” looked an awful lot like an “e”, but again, as many of you noticed, the “e” at the beginning of “end” is very different from the “i” in “racism”. I stand corrected. Mea culpa. Young man, 1; Richard 0.
However, I am not down for the proverbial count.
Regardless of whether it’s spelled properly or not, what tattoo artist worth his patchouli would create such a tricky looking “e”, which to casual observers like moi appears to be a typographical error of significant proportions? And more importantly, what kind of person would have “End Racism” placed forever on his back? Yes, of course it’s a noble sentiment, but it’s perhaps better suited for a bumper sticker, don’t you think? And besides, what is this young, left-leaning rebel to do when someone actually puts an end to racism, eh? He’ll be like all those people who had “Destroy the Iron Curtain” tattooed on their forearms, then 1990 came along, and they were like, “Maybe I’ll just cover it up with that cool C&C Music Factory logo….”
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